Quote:
Originally Posted by Steph37
I weigh my hermanns hatchlings once a month now cos I dont want them to grow!! At last weigh in they were, at 8 months 99gm, 124gm 125gm. That sounds shocking but my mum's females are big (they all hatched every year at between 8-10gm). I dont want to wake them up now, but have measured them on the Jacksons hatchling ratio and they are perfect. They are 75% minimum weed fed with romaine if I'm short on weeds. I give them (best quality-not shop bought) pellets but only once a week and I'm cutting that back. They are as smooth as possible but I understand that pyraminding starts usually between 12-18 months so am watching them like a hawk. Dont understand how they can get overweight on weeds (I wish I could use that excuse-ha!). They eat mainly dandelions (and all that family-they like the lambs tongue?) plantain, mallow, vetch, clover, sticky bud, forget me not (not keen on them though). One of them is into flowers so loves the flowers of all of these plants and also loves pansy flowers. I am trying to widen the ratio of weeds cos they sulk if they dont have dandelions as I know they shouldnt have them every day.
The one my mum has kept is the same age but weighs 40gms but has kept it back cos it seems like a 'runt'-maybe not (although she does have sight problems which are being treeted) Her 18 month old from the only fertile egg a younger mum had the year before is nearly 300gm! (with attitude) I want mine to grow more slowly but as they are ok on the JR and I am feeding them correctly I dont see what I can do!
I dont limit weeds though and never have. I think on previous threads most people have said they dont limit weeds, although I can see the need to limit pellets etc.Steph
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It's worrying how people use the Jackson Ratio as a "well its the right size for the weight so that must be ok"
It just doesn't work like that(IMO). The whole idea of the jackson ratio is that it is used to work out wether a tortoise of a certain species is of the right weight and size for hibernation or not, although it can also help to identify torts that are of a low weight for their size through illness or other problems too
A hatchling Hermann's when first hatched can weigh anything from 6-7 grams when born to a wopping 16-17 grams
(from my own experience) and has alot to do with size of the parents (mainly mum from personal experience). A hatchling (from many reliabl web sites) should put on no more then 1-2 grams a month for at least the first couple of year of its life to help aid smooth slow growth. So it would make sense to me that people actually worked out the correct weight of their young Hermann's by adding the 1-2 grams for every month of its life plus its hatch weight rather then going by the "Jackson Ratio Chart" as this would give a more detailed picture of wether or not they are growing too quickly or not.
Just My own opinion of course!
But maybe its some thing that someone could look into making like the Jackson ratio so members could map out the correct weight gain for their very young torts.
I have herd of several breeders now that actually give with their hatchlings when sold a chart showing the hatch weight of the tort with the expected weight gain on it so that the new owners has something to go on and try to adear too. Its a steep learning curve sometimes taking on such a young tortoise and even with the best researchand intentions in the world its still easy to run into problems........just like people do that have been keeping torts for oodles of years do occasionally too, this is because husbandry ideas are always on the change and so is feeding ideas too,some work, some don't, its all trial and error kind of
